Dickie toys of germany makes a 1/14 scale Bay window 1967-71 Volkswagen Type-2 Transporter. I got mine off amazon, but apparently they were available at walmart for a short time.

It has a friction drive gearbox with a flywheel, and steering rack and knuckles with 3 position posing. Everything is screwed together or plastic tabs.

All the doors work, 7 passenger interior, detail is very impressive, and it can seat bruder figures. I'm glad it's more of a normal bus than the export model 19 window sambas with sliding top that are normally done as toys.

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It's your world. Maybe you put a tree there, maybe have a stream through here, maybe you make happy clouds, it doesn't matter. It's whatever you want to make, there are no mistakes.

I pulled the transaxle out. Unscrew body from pan, unsnap rear seat tabs, unsnap engine cover tabs. rims pull straight off, 3 screws and the transaxle comes out. 3 screws and you can pull one side of the gearbox apart, pull out the flywheel.

I used a mitsumi pancake motor out of a CD-rom drive. Some 0.040 styrene was laminated to the center beam for motor mount. Then the side plate that supported the flywheel was clearanced and reinstalled.

Needed to do some trimming and put some color on the dash details.

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It's your world. Maybe you put a tree there, maybe have a stream through here, maybe you make happy clouds, it doesn't matter. It's whatever you want to make, there are no mistakes.

I picked up a horizon hobby SPMS401 mini servo. Trimmed away stuff until it fit. I punched a servo mount ear through the right wheelwell and built up a stack of styrene to secure a screw. I mounted the other ear to a styrene plate that i brought forward and screwed into the tunnel between seats. Draglink needed a little clearancing and an oval hole for the servo since i'm using the wrong arc of its swing

Trim seats for clearance.

While i was in there i also raised the steering knuckle supports by a bit less than the amount hanging below the knuckles. Clearanced the supports that tie the front and middle of the pan so the draglink could articulate. Drilled through the stop plates above the steering knuckles so they can articulate up.
I'm going to drop some pen springs in the front and cap the top. Or maybe i decide it has drop spindles and forget to do it.

Then i loosened the forward transaxle mount screw, and put springs between screw head and transaxle at both rear mounts.

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It's your world. Maybe you put a tree there, maybe have a stream through here, maybe you make happy clouds, it doesn't matter. It's whatever you want to make, there are no mistakes.

Yesterday a 20amp reversable esc with brake option showed up. (i like overkill better than magic smoke.) It's made of chineseieum, so no documentation at all and not labeled on the wires. I learned that a male JST connector would be battery, therefore female got chop off and changed to male deans. Moved fem jst to motor for easy mx later. Then it all dropped into place.

It's got a brake switch mounted on the board, but i forgot to play with it to see if mine has a dragbrake, or a double-pump to reverse, or a race switch.

All the components tuck away nicely into the engine bay, i did notch the package tray near the spare tire to route my battery wires up. I punched a hole through the floorpan for rx switch. I didn't even have to lose the upright engine plate, so that's going to need more detail when you pop the hood.

I really get why these are so frequently converted by the germans over on modellbau! It's a very slick and minimal pain build for what I think is a great looking model.

Surfboards are stupid, but it could work IF i could have found 1/14 bikini girls. The surf rack looks wrong for topracks, or a cargo rack, maybe a ladder rack...
i'd rather a slick top, but then you've got to fill holes and repaint, and the rack keeps it off the table when you have to split body and pan. Grrr.

Screw it, let's just go ride bikes.

Spinmaster made 'finger bikes' a while back. I'd bought a few of them for my 1/10 crawler (scaler cherokee), but couldn't scale them right. Turns out in 1/14 scale i've got a 20" bmx/mountain, 24" bmx/mountain, and 26" road bike.

0.040 styrene, bonder, and some vague idea. With some careful planning, the bike racks still can slide out the back of the rack so it still protects the roof upside down. The bikes are secure but still removeable

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It's your world. Maybe you put a tree there, maybe have a stream through here, maybe you make happy clouds, it doesn't matter. It's whatever you want to make, there are no mistakes.

I picked up some cheap clicky-pens to gut for the springs. Pulled the front seat out, dropped springs through the kingpin hole. Took a couple tries to get spring length right to get the front of the bus off the bumpstops. Atleast the front seat can go in/out without splitting the body/pan.

****. Uh, anybody have a tow-truck?

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It's your world. Maybe you put a tree there, maybe have a stream through here, maybe you make happy clouds, it doesn't matter. It's whatever you want to make, there are no mistakes.